Monday, January 7, 2013

He woke up at 2:40am Saturday with that distinctive seal-bark cough. Bob had croup and was having trouble taking a breath. Taking him into the cold night air was the best thing I could do for his wheezing, according to my old pal, WebMD. We left Jeff and the dogs in bed and I bundled Bob up in a puffy coat over his pajamas. We got in the car for a slow drive around the neighborhood.

Bob was very brave. He took big gulping breaths, holding his head out the window like a Labrador. His breathing eased. We toured the nearby streets. We drove past Bob's school and Clementine's house. We drove past Sabine's, and Micah's, Desmond's, Felix's, Ferruccio's, and Cleo's grandma's place. We pictured our friends, sleeping in their beds. We talked about who in the neighborhood still had their Christmas lights up and who turns off their porch light at bedtime. We sang along to songs on the radio. We cruised.

We came back and had a drink of water. I set up the vaporizer next to the bed and and as Bob fell back to sleep he whispered, "Mom, I love you." Our dog Teddy crawled up and rested his head on the pillow next to Bob's. It was a regular night again. Soon, we were dreaming.

So much illness this winter. You are such a good mom, you know. My daughter asked me recently how to know if one of her sons has the croup. I told her, "You'll know. You will definitely know."It's such horrible thing to have to face in the late, late night hours. But somehow we all do it. And you do it with grace.

I have bad asthma and sometimes the cough sounds like I'm choking to death. It scares others but I just turn on the air conditioner, which stops it. But if I heard a child cough like that I'd like to think I'd be calm enough to turn to WebMD. Hey, maybe *I* should turn to WebMD?

I'm amazed that this works!! I have a son with chronic bouts of the croup too - we took him to the ER a few months ago and it was scary, even for a mom who grew up going to the hospital for asthma attacks. Glad he's OK.

wow. that's scary but so glad you (your dr. web md) knew what to do. it also sounded kind of fun. i guess that's what good mom's do. make crappy situations somehow pleasurable in a mommy kind of way. xoxo